I saw these Octopus Dinner Rolls in a magazine (can’t remember which one) and thought they’d be fun to tackle with my girls.

They do take a few minutes to shape, but they’re pretty easy to make – and especially fun to eat!

I used crescent rolls that had a butter flavor in them already, but if yours don’t (or you’re making your own dough), you can always wrap up a small chunk of butter inside the “head.”

The process of turning these triangles into an octopus is surprisingly easy: cut the end opposite the point into 8 pieces. Then tuck the pointed end under and bunch it up into a ball. Voila!

I asked the girls to help me arrange the myriad legs, but they were really much more interested in adding the eyes.

My 4yo even used the tweezers from her bug collecting kit to place them on. (Don’t worry – we washed them first!)

Here they are, all ready to bake.

You should make sure the legs aren’t touching, but the dough doesn’t spread much during baking, so they can be pretty close.

Also, I baked one tray the full recommended baking time on the package (see above photo) and the other tray a few minutes less (see below).

Undercooking them slightly ensures that the tips don’t brown, but the head will be a bit underdone. Now, that didn’t bother me or my girls at all – but then, neither did the crunchy legs of the fully cooked ones.

The crispy tips didn’t present a problem for us in the least, so really, how long you decide to bake them is up to your personal preference.

And if you want to shape them ahead of time, you can put the octopus-filled, parchment-lined trays in the fridge until you’re ready to bake them. Such as on Halloween. :)

Personally, I think everyone should make an octopus-shaped hot dot at least once in their life. And if you have kids, they – more than likely – love hot dogs. So: problem solved. Go and make yourself some octopuses for dinner. Or octopi. Either way.

And to get extra creative, dab on some mustard eyes and throw them in a bed of zucchini seaweed:

Okay, I know: my “seaweed” looks a little mushy. That’s because I shredded the zucchini kinda small. Looked a little more like angel hair than linguine. Still, it gets the point across.

To make the hot dogs, I sliced through them before cooking them. You could them boil or microwave them.

To make the zucchini, I shredded it, and then threw it in a frying pan with some olive oil, salt, pepper, and garlic powder for a few minutes.

Granted, my kids were far too excited about the hot dogs to pay much attention to the zucchini, but they did eat a little. If you’d prefer, you could always serve the dogs over some spaghetti that you cooked with a little green food coloring instead.

Now, I do try to avoid adding a lot of food coloring into my kid’s diet, but every now and then, color just makes things fun. Of course, these pancakes would also work without the color, if you prefer.

So, what you see in the photos is that I used Bisquick to make these pancakes. I stirred in a little purple gel food coloring, and then poured the mix into a squeeze bottle. To make this successful, you have to make the batter a little thin. Otherwise, it will get stuck in the nozzle. So use a small whisk or a fork to make sure there are no big clumps.

Then, heat up your pan or griddle and grease it like you normally would for pancakes. And then: the fun begins.

The squeeze bottles allow you to draw pretty much any shape you’d like. As you can see above, I drew some hearts, but also some “swirls” in crazy patterns. The swirls were especially fun to eat. Especially with your hands. :)

But, I also like to say that all food is finger food to toddlers. Honestly, as long as my kids eat, I don’t care if they use their hands. As long as they’re eating, they could use their toes.

Anyway, to achieve the best results for solid shapes (hearts, stars, etc), draw the outline first and then quickly fill it in.

And remember that it doesn’t have to be perfect. Your kids will love you anyway. Plus, older kids will probably want to get in on it.

To spruce up the pancakes, add a little cinnamon to the batter. Or sprinkle some chocolate chips or small blueberries over them after you’ve drawn your shape on the griddle, but before you flip them.

Have fun! And if you tackle this food art, please let me know what you make!

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